I'm telling you, things are getting out of hand. Or maybe I'm discovering that things were never in my hands. (Real Life Preacher)

I have a lot of finished objects to share today. Not because I've done a lot of knitting; it's because the last time I shared my progress was three weeks ago.

I did finish the socks for my cousin Danielle, and my daughter was able to take them on her visit to New Jersey. I've mentioned this before, but I really love Deb Barnhill's Back to Basics pattern. This was the third pair I've made using this pattern. The yarn was Red Heart's Heart and Sole, which is a nice easy-care sock yarn. The picture doesn't really do the colors justice. There is a great turquoise stripe that I thought would clash but ended up keeping the oranges from being too bright. I think they would be wonderful to wear with casual jeans.


I also managed to finish a shawl for Aunt Robin before my daughter's trip. In fact, I wove the ends just in time to tuck the shawl into the suitcase before taking Becka to the airport. And wouldn't you know, she was so busying visiting with the relatives that she forgot to give Aunt Robin the shawl. So I'll have to mail it later this week.

And then I'll have to stop and buy some more Lion Brand Homespun. The yarn is horrible to work with; it splits way too easy. But the finished result is the most incredibly soft, warm shawl that I wanted to sit and cuddle under all night. So I guess I'll add one for myself to the queue.

After rushing to finish the two gifts, I decided to take a break. I did two basic preemie hats for Loops of Love. I feel bad that I'm doing such basic hats, but the Bernat Softee Baby is self-striping and turns out so pretty there didn't seem any point to knitting fancy.

I spent a lot of time knitting on my Blankie, finishing 27 squares since my last update. Which means that I'm 32 squares ahead of my goal to knit one square per day. Luckily I received another mini swap, so I have more pretty yarn to use. This swap was the 4switchmeknot swap in Ravelry, and it was the easiest swap ever. All I had to do was pick out which yarn I liked best from the website. The yarns were measured and skeined for us, and she even sent out a surprise stitch marker. I've picked out a couple of skeins of sock yarn for my stash, if I manage to sneak any money out of my budget. (Not likely in the near future, but still.)




Sunday I started a pair of baby socks using the "leftover" yarn my friend Paula gave me. (I had tried to get her to give me the entire skein, because it was so pretty and I loved it. But she was able to resist my "pretty-please" face. So I settled for the leftovers for my sock blanket. And these baby socks.) When I started these socks, I thought that they would be a good way to teach sock making. But knitting such a tiny sock is a bit fiddly, so I'm not sure that it will work out.

By the way, the picture was taken with the sock sitting on a 3x5 index card, just to give you a sense of size. The pattern is Pieces of Eight (Susan Lawrence).


I started one more project. This one has been on my queue, so casting on was a good thing. These are the French Press Slippers. So far I've done the soles, and one of the four sides. It's a quick knit, I did this much while watching a movie, but since I have to keep track of which row I'm on in the pattern it's not something I can take around with me.